Maidan Part II

By Volodymyr Kish

Just less than a decade ago, the Ukrainian people rebelled against the obviously fraudulent election results that saw Victor Yanukovich declared President of Ukraine. Perseverance, determination and unity triumphed in what became known as the Orange Revolution and Victor Yushchenko was eventually rightfully declared the President. For the long-suffering Ukrainian people it seemed at long last that their dreams of a truly free and independent Ukraine were finally to be realized.

Alas, as has often happened in Ukraine’s long and tragic history, that dream disappeared in a cloud of incompetence and betrayal on the part of the Ukrainian leadership. Whether Yushchenko knowingly betrayed his people, or was simply totally lacking in political skills and leadership, the end result was the return of Yanukovich to power and his subsequent almost total usurpation of power and control of the Ukrainian nation. The end result is that democracy and justice has been steadily erodied away while the wealth of the country has been increasingly rerouted into the hands and bank accounts of the Yanukovich family and his rapacious band of oligarchs.

Yet despite all this, Ukrainians still held some hope that better times were ahead as the Yanukovich regime dangled the prospect of Ukraine signing an association agreement with the European Union. This held the promise, that despite the dire current state of Ukraine, such an agreement would eventually bring much needed political and economic reforms as Ukraine became integrated with its European brethren. That hope was dashed last week when President Yanukovich’s flunky, Prime Minister Azarov, indicated that Ukraine was suspending the further pursuit of such an agreement in favour of establishing closer ties with Russia and Putin’s chimera of a new Customs Union of former Soviet states, which in reality is little more than an attempt to establish a new Russian empire.

This cannot be viewed as anything else but a betrayal, as virtually all polls in Ukraine have shown that an overwhelming majority of Ukraine’s population were in favour of the European Union. No doubt, Putin made Yanukovich an offer he couldn’t refuse, and all of Ukraine is now the loser.

The announcement has been met with much anger and bitterness by Ukrainians the world over. For the past several days, numerous protests and demonstrations have broken out all over Ukraine as well as all countries where the Ukrainian diaspora is present. The centre of the protests has once again become Independence Square or the “Maidan” in Kyiv, where the Orange Revolution blossomed a decade ago. The Square has been renamed “Euro Maidan” by the protesters, and this past Sunday some one hundred thousand protesters took over the square, reminiscent of the huge crowds that filled the same venue during the Orange Revolution.

The question now becomes whether the protests can match the numbers, passion and determination that fueled the Orange Revolution. Can they be sustained and powerful enough to force Yanukovich and the authorities to once again yield to the demands of the majority of the Ukrainian people?

Obviously Yanukovich is counting on the protests to peter out. With many of the original leaders of the Orange Revolution now either in prison, retired from political life, cooperating with the current regime or rendered powerless by the authorities, he feels confident he can ride out the immediate storm and return to his dangerous game of playing off the Russians against the Europeans and maximizing what he can get from both. It was interesting to note that he did not unequivocally throw in his lot with the Russians, but merely positioned it as a suspension of talks with the European Union while he negotiates a potentially better deal with Russia and the Customs Union.

While ostensibly a victory for Putin and the Russians, very little is clear and obvious as to what Yanukovich really has in mind. In my opinion, this is just another indication of Yanukovich’s failure to make a clear decision as to Ukraine’s future. The only thing we can be sure of is that Yanukovich’s top priority is not what is good for Ukraine, but what is best for Yanukovich and his future, and on that I still do not believe he has the slightest clue on which way to go.

The next move rest with the Ukrainian people. Either they rise up in strength against this latest perfidious offence against them, or start getting used to another decade of exploitation and humiliation.